And so, today, RIM announced its Hail Mary - a brand new mobile operating system (well, sort-of new), as well as two new devices. In addition, the Canadian company also officially changed its name from Research In Motion to Blackberry. The firstfewreviews of Blackberry 10 are already out, and it's not bad. The problem, however, is that in the case of Blackberry, 'not bad' could easily mean 'not good enough'.

As you wrote its the first iteration and going to improve. It already improved a lot according to those I know who had access to that before and gave it tries (like on the Playbook).

To try to get the Android ecosystem aboard is a very good strategy. The execution seems to be not finished yet but if it is it will pay out.

I don't know how good of a strategy it is. It is supposed to be a short-term fix. Android ports of popular apps while they convince people to write native BB10 apps.

However if it wont be ready in the short term, then its pointless.

What the hell kind of experience is it to have an app store filled with a bunch of foreign feeling apps, which do everything from text selection to navigation using a different UI paradigm than the host platform. That's nonsensical.

For the platform-integration: That is a vital point in many cases but in some its not that important. Games for example. If they are stable and reasonable fast its enough reason for that bridge to exist and to be supported and delivered on the devices.

Games are a small exception, but again, if performance isn't up to snuff, its a moot point. There is no advantage at this point in time.

With Android, HTML5, Qt, native and AIR they seem to offer a rather bright set of very different ways to get apps on there platform. This I see as very unique selling point. It decreases the investment needed to bring apps to there platform and maintain them in many cases. Taken the small market share it may still not be enough to convince everybody to bring there apps over but I think it still decreases the burden significant and so ROI can be reached faster.

I disagree with the direction, but I can understand why they chose to do what they did. It isn't easy to bootstrap an OS.

I just wonder how many AIR apps exist to matter, or how many meaningful HTML5 apps (I'm still waiting for someone to point me to one good HTML5 app) are ported.

I'd be interested in the breakdown between Native, HTML5 and Android ports on BlackBerry World.

If the dev-story is improved future, like better Android integration, then I think its a huge advantage and the fruits become a selling point. My hope is many more platforms start similar projects to easier developers work. Its the way to go.

This Android compatibility everywhere needs to die. This is such a terrible idea from a UX POV that its not even funny. It is almost beyond words that a developer is able to sleep at night knowing that they did some half-assed port of their Android app.

BlackBerry's QML based native platform is very good. They just need to convince people to use it, and not port their Android garbage over.

I'm worried about how BlackBerry World will look a year from now. Potentially a bigger wasteland than the Android app store.

+1000!!
I'm willing to give BB a shot maybe 6 - 12 months down the road, but only if the majority of applications are native. I already have an Android device for Android apps, and tbh, I'm not that satisfied with the quality (it's a Nexus 7 btw, so don't give me bull about having an obscure unsupported device). Hope to see devs taking BB10 seriously.

I'm worried about how BlackBerry World will look a year from now. Potentially a bigger wasteland than the Android app store.

Similar worries on my end. The Play Store is just a couple of steps away from being a full-on warez cesspool, imho. It'll be interesting to see how BB World goes about its QC process.

What the hell kind of experience is it to have an app store filled with a bunch of foreign feeling apps

You never used Windows or? :-)

Serious, from WinAmp over Java Swing to iTunes. From classic Win95, over Ribbon to Metro. Its all there.

Games are a small exception, but again, if performance isn't up to snuff, its a moot point. There is no advantage at this point in time.

What I hear is that for example playing Jetpack Joyride is fine. A game in the appWorld using the Android runtime. That game is btw still missing in the WP market place despite multiple past announcements and years passed.

I'm still waiting for someone to point me to one good HTML5 app

HTML5 is rather new. Chromebook, FirefoxOS, Tizen, WebOS and now Blackberry 10 joins that. Where is the problem?

This Android compatibility everywhere needs to die. This is such a terrible idea from a UX POV

Give it some time to improve future. Meanwhile its already useful enough. SailfishOS and Ubuntu Phone plan something similar as far as I remember.

Wouldn't wonder if Microsoft does that too. There Phone app story certainly failed and they really need to do something to address the shortcomings. Compatibility would be a good starter.

I'm worried about how BlackBerry World will look a year from now. Potentially a bigger wasteland than the Android app store.

Yeah, we known by now you think only WP has the real alive app store. *roll eyes*

Serious, from WinAmp over Java Swing to iTunes. From classic Win95, over Ribbon to Metro. Its all there.

And this is exactly the situation that BlackBerry should seek to avoid. A situation that's being actively remedied with Windows 8/Windows RT.

I think most people (except you, of course) recognize that user experience is a real thing, and as such, requires real investment.

Since when was mediocrity sufficient?

What I hear is that for example playing Jetpack Joyride is fine. A game in the appWorld using the Android runtime. That game is btw still missing in the WP market place despite multiple past announcements and years passed.

I sure hope it runs fine, it would be great if it does. I think you're confused, I'm not trying to dig at BlackBerry, but at this entire idea in general.

If games are able to perform acceptably, then fine. I'm just interested in what pain this eases, given that a majority of games are written in platform agnotic C++ with middleware that abstracts away a lot of the details.

Jetpack Joyride is on Windows 8, and I imagine that tuning a game for the delicate constraint of a mobile phone is warranting more investment. That's my guess, again, I'm not a developer on their team, but this seems like a Red herring.

HTML5 is rather new. Chromebook, FirefoxOS, Tizen, WebOS and now Blackberry 10 joins that. Where is the problem?

So, you can't provide one? Gotcha. This obsession (because that's what it is) with using a sub-par, terribly performing, primitively tooled, and incomplete platform as a world class application framework is a little sickening to me. The thing is half backed. It takes an extraordinary amount of effort to get anything running well, and it doesn't really pay off.

About 5% of Windows Store apps are actually HTML5 based, another 5% C++, and 80% C#.

Give it some time to improve future. Meanwhile its already useful enough. SailfishOS and Ubuntu Phone plan something similar as far as I remember.

Wouldn't wonder if Microsoft does that too. There Phone app story certainly failed and they really need to do something to address the shortcomings. Compatibility would be a good starter.

Time is something BlackBerry has precious little of, especially when the resources would be better put elsewhere. They bought themselves time with BB10, but not unlimited time. They're not Microsoft.

I think Microsoft has shown the right way to do HTML5 already with WinJS which outperforms any HTML stack on any platform (Install timed JITd JavaScript, H/W accelerated rendering, JS promises, integration into WinRT, etc.)

It should be coming to Windows Phone in due time.

Yeah, we known by now you think only WP has the real alive app store. *roll eyes*

Well, to burn your little strawman down, I think the iOS App Store has much more quality in it than the Android App Store.